Strickland cabinet choices praised: Budget, tax chiefs called key to success of governor's budget, expected March 15
BYLINE: Mark Niquette, The Columbus Dispatch, Ohio
Mar. 4--Former Gov. Richard F. Celeste says his favorite story about J. Pari Sabety involves a Chrysler vice president pulling him aside during a 1990 Toledo news conference.
Celeste had assigned Sabety, his executive assistant for economic development, to represent the state in negotiations with Chrysler and the city of Toledo to expand Jeep production there without sacrificing environmental standards. The Chrysler executive wanted to hire her, Celeste said.
"He turned to me and said, 'I don't know where you found that Pari Sabety, but she's the toughest negotiator I've ever sat down with,' " Celeste recalled.
But Celeste turned him down, and when the surprised Chrysler executive demanded to know why, Celeste told him the answer was simple: He planned to go into business with Sabety himself when he left office a few months later.
"Pari knew how to keep her eye on the ball to do what was necessary, but to do it in the right way," Celeste said.
Celeste told the story last week when asked how effective he thinks Sabety will be as Gov. Ted Strickland's budget director. He also had high praise for Richard A. Levin, who served as deputy tax commissioner during Celeste's administration and now is tax commissioner under Strickland.
Sabety and Levin, two of Strickland's first cabinet appointments, are playing critical roles as the governor approaches a major milestone of his new administration: the March 15 release of his first state budget.
"The most important quality in those jobs, I believe, is a willingness to speak truth to power," Celeste said. "You shouldn't be a tax commissioner to tell the governor just what he wants to hear. ... You have to tell the governor what he needs to hear, and the same is true for a budget director. So I think the governor will be well served with these two."
Sabety, 51, a New Jersey native, said she came to Ohio in the early 1980s mostly because her husband attended Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland and did political work in that area.
She joined the accounting firm Arthur Andersen in Columbus in 1983 and recalls being the first woman in the office to return to work after having a baby.
It was through a friend, Paul Ryder, an executive assistant for Celeste, that Sabety came to join the administration during Celeste's second term -- even though she had not worked in state government before.
"I told (Ryder) I didn't know anything about state government, and he said, 'You know, that's not what you need to know. You need to know about how to ask the right questions and how to think straight and talk straight,' " Sabety said. "I guess those are the three things I've been working with since then."
Sabety said she and Celeste "hit it off quite well," so they formed a consulting firm after Celeste left office in 1991 and specialized in technology-led economic-development strategies for cities, regions and states.
After Celeste became an ambassador to India, they sold the firm in 1998 and Sabety went on to do work on technology and economic-development issues at Ohio State University's Fisher College of Business and at Brookings Institution in Washington.
Sabety says she has admired Strickland for many years after meeting him as a first-term congressman, so when he asked her to join his team, she didn't hesitate.
Strickland and his chief of staff, John Haseley, decided Sabety would be a good fit as budget director, and she thinks her policy background meshes well with her staff's experience in budget, management and legislative issues.
Sabety also prefers having to produce a budget in less than three months -- even a tight budget with tough spending decisions expected ---- rather than having time to settle in the office first.
"I actually believe this is a much better way to be able to make change, and I think what the voters voted for was change," she said.
Levin, 61, said he never thought he would return to the state Tax Department when he left in 1991 after Celeste's second term ended.
Levin had worked for nearly 20 years in the department, first as research director and for the final eight years as deputy tax commissioner under former Commissioner Joanne Limbach.
But after working as a tax consultant for 15 years in the firm Levin, Driscoll & Fleeter with clients that included state and local governments, school districts and business associations, Levin said he became intrigued with Strickland and the chance to return to the Tax Department.
"As I got to know him in some meetings with him, I was very impressed with him on a personal level," Levin said. "I just felt I'd like to be part of the administration and do it in an area I'm familiar with and make a contribution."
Limbach said Levin was so respected that her Republican successor named a research library reading room in the office after him.
"Rich is the kind of government public servant that everyone wants," Limbach said.
"He really cares about doing the right thing; he's open, he's a good listener, he's a hard worker and he's bright -- even though he is an economist," she joked.
Levin said the biggest difference in the Tax Department since he last worked there is that staff members are more qualified and better trained, and technology has advanced considerably.
"When I left in 1991, I think I had a computer on my desk, but I didn't know what to do with it," he said.
Levin also hopes that his experience dealing with the tax system in the private sector as a small businessman gives him a broader perspective as commissioner.
Strickland said he had asked Levin to explain the complex tax policy to him even before he decided to run for governor in 2005, and that his nickname for Sabety is "my brain."
"I think the two of them are really a good pair," Strickland said. "Pari is very outgoing and gregarious, while Rich is more a quiet thinker. So I think the two of them in combination are serving me and the state of Ohio very well."
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